Catch me?

Chapter 2

"Oh, Lumine and Paimon. You're here."

"Was that your pathetic attempt at heroism? I'll have you know, by saving me, you've shown mercy to someone who has threatened and harmed the people of this land. I thought you liked playing hero in front of the public? Won't they be upset when they know how embarrassingly you were trying to hold on to me? Oh, and for the record, you better get it in your head that I'm not someone who's 'broken', who needs to be 'fixed' by the mighty Traveler."

After Irminsul was saved from the corruption of forbidden knowledge, the Traveler had returned to the Sanctuary of Surasthana to pay a visit to Nahida. What she wasn't expecting, however, was to find the God of Wisdom and the almost God of Sanity casually having breakfast together. Of course, there was no conversation at the table. It seemed like where Nahida was held prisoner before had, in fact, become a new sanctuary for a new prisoner. And without missing a beat, the previous words were the first things Scaramouche had spat at her when he first laid his eyes on her arriving figure.

"You seem awfully talkative even after having your gnosis taken away. Are you sure you didn't actually hit your head in the fall? And, hey, who are you saying was trying to hold on to you? You must be delusional!", her floating companion retorted back animatedly.

"Someone simply had to catch you, right? I just let it be myself. If I hadn't caught you when I did, someone would seriously have to fix that puppet body of yours, no?"

Scaramouche still couldn't believe what she had done. Right before he closed his eyes, he saw the Traveler, whom he was trying to eliminate from the face of Teyvat just moments ago, dash towards his falling body, frantically trying to catch him in time. He couldn't quite process why she would try to help someone who almost squashed her to death, nor did he want to think about all that when the very purpose of his life was snatched away from right under his nose.

He couldn't believe Buer who had the audacity to take away his gnosis from him and then plant the cushiony cube beneath the Traveler so that neither of them would get hurt. Why would the God of Wisdom show him mercy when he had apparently taken her gnosis away from her a hundred and sixty eight times before? Why would she help him lay low in the Sanctuary of Surasthana while he recovered even after he threatened the wellbeing of her very own people? Even if it were to make use of what remnants of divinity he had left in him, it made no sense to treat him so hospitably.

Even Lumine herself didn't believe the excuse she had come up with. She just let herself be the one who caught him just because someone had to? No, that didn't sound right. No one in that place could be blamed if they had simply let him fall to the ground and come disassembled by the impact of it. Yet, what exactly was it that compelled her to become his safety net? Something that made her feel like it would be the end if no one tried to reach out. End? End of what? The 'mighty Traveler' seemed to have some unanswerable questions. However, she decided not to ponder over them too much. After all, she had better things to do, like getting an explanation from Nahida about what he was doing there in the Sanctuary.

Scaramouche, on the other hand, had been wondering about this ever since he woke up from his coma. No one would even bother thinking about stopping him from entering the Tatarasuna furnace. In fact, he had been chosen to become the sacrifice since he wasn't human, he was a puppet after all. So it was justified to sacrifice him, apparently. So when the very person he was fighting till one of them died tried to catch him from falling, he didn't know what to make of it.

His attempt at achieving godhood, at fulfilling the purpose he was created for, it all seemed like such a meaningless attempt to him now. What good would godhood do him if he never even had someone who would be willing to catch him when he fell? No, no, this did not mean that the Traveler was an ally. After all, he himself was the one who wanted to crush her to death. But it did make the puppet wonder what it would be like to have someone as strong as her as an ally, by his side. He had felt like the Traveler did behave like she cared for him on multiple occasions, sometimes almost like someone who considered him a friend. But he always thought of her as some hypocrite who wanted to try to save everyone she came across with a shallow sense of heroism. But he didn't expect her to go to such lengths to help him. Well, at least it wasn't something that affected him negatively.